





V 







A CENTURY 



OF 


MINING AND METALLURGY 


IN THE 


UNITED STATES. 


GE^TTEITKIAL ADDRESS 


OF 

✓ 

ITon. ABRAM S. HEWITT, 

PRESIDENT ELECT OP THE AMERICAN INSTITUTE OF MINING ENGINEERS. 


Philadelphia, June 20, 1876. 















4 













25771 


« 





'Vt'l ^ 






A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 
IN THE UNITED STATES. 


Gentlemen : If my first words were other than those of thanks 
for the high honor of being called to preside over the American 
Institute of Mining Engineers, I should do injustice alike to you 
and to my own sense of the obligation, under which I have been 
placed by your voluntary choice. When the position was first sug¬ 
gested to me, I resolutely declined to allow the use of my name, on 
the ground that, by training and occupation, I was not entitled to 
this honor, which, it then seemed to me, should be conferred only 
on a professional engineer. In fact, the history of the Institute, 
which had honored itself, as well as my distinguished predecessors, 
David Thomas, Rossiter W. Raymond, and Alexander L. Holley, 
by elevating them to its highest office, seemed to indicate the line 
and the limit of safe precedent, in which I did not then see how I 
could be included. 

But my scruples were finally removed by the consideration that, 
as in the course of human industry, the pioneer, of whom Mr. Thomas 
was so marked a type, must precede the mining engineer, so fitly 
personified in Dr. Raymond, and be followed by the mechanical 
engineer, whose incarnation we behold in Mr. Holley; so all these 
must be supplemented by the man of affairs and finance,, in order 
that u enterprises of great pith and moment ” may be prosecuted to 
a successful issue. I felt, therefore, that I had no longer any right 
to resist your preference, or to deprive myself of what I must regard 
as the crowning honor of an active career. 

On an occasion like the present it seems appropriate to review the 
history in this country, during the last hundred years, of those indus¬ 
tries which the Institute of Mining Engineers specially represents. 
There is much in the story with which other members of this body 
are more familiarly acquainted than myself; yet I fancy that to all 



2 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


of them, and not less to our distinguished, and most heartily welcome 
guests from abroad, a comprehensive outline of the progress of 
mining and metallurgy in the United States will prove interesting. 
I ask your attention, therefore, to a condensed account of that sub¬ 
ject, embracing a statement of the beginnings of the industry on our 
shores of the notable events attending its increase, and of its present 
condition after a hundred years of national life. The extent and 
rate of our progress will be shown more clearly by figures than by 
words, and I shall offer a series of tables, carefully compiled from 
the best available sources, and showing the production of each of the 
leading metals, year by year. This general survey would be incom¬ 
plete without some account of the legislation of the Federal govern¬ 
ment with regard to mining, the principles upon which it has been 
based, the effects which it has produced ; and, finally, I shall attempt 
to point out some causes and agencies which, under our institutions 
and habits, may be, in my opinion, relied upon to effect certain great 
ends of technical efficiency, political economy, and social equity, 
which our government has not attempted, and could not fairly be 
expected, to achieve. 

Many of the topics I have named are more or less familiar to me 
in my experience as a man of business, a student of public affairs, 
and a zealous inquirer into the social and industrial problems of the 
present generation. But the collection and arrangement of facts in 
my possession, the search for other facts to complete the record, and 
the orderly expression of the whole in connected form, would have 
been a labor at this time utterly beyond my powers, already over¬ 
taxed by intense and continuous occupation in another sphere, had I 
not been able to avail myself of the assistance of Dr. Raymond, 
whose thorough acquaintance with a large portion of the field I was 
attempting to cover, and whose ready comprehension of the nature 
of my plan enabled him to render me a service so essential that I 
cannot consent to omit an explicit recognition of it. 

Mining enterprises were among the motive powers to the explora¬ 
tion, conquest, and colonization of the New World. The desire to 
find a shorter route to the profitable trade of India, the desire to con¬ 
quer new territory, wherever it might be found, in the name of some 
Catholic or Protestant sovereign of Europe, were accompanied, both 
in North and South America, by eager hopes of the discovery of gold 
and silver. 

The history of the plunder of the metallic wealth and the devel¬ 
opment of the mineral resources of Mexico and South America, does 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


3 


not lie within my present purpose. The early enterprises of this kind 
in the northern part of the continent were less successful, though the 
progress of two hundred years has made them more beneficial to 
national prosperity, for reasons which I shall, perhaps, be able to 
indicate. # 

Gold was found in moderate quantities in use among the Indian 
tribes of the present Southern States. The Spaniards under De Soto, 
following this clue, and led on by stories, exaggerated or misunder¬ 
stood, of their Indian guides, made a wide superficial exploration in 
search of the origin of this treasure. They are supposed to have 
excavated many of the diggings in North and South Carolina and 
Georgia, which are now overgrown with forests. But no rich 
deposits appear to have been discovered, and no permanent opera¬ 
tions undertaken. 

In the great charter of King James, by which, in 1606, the right 
to explore and settle the North American continent from the thirty- 
fourth to the forty-fifth parallel, was granted to the London and 
Plymouth Companies, it was provided that one-fifth of the gold and 
silver, and one-fifteenth of the copper, which might be discovered, 
should belong to the crown. One of the earliest expeditions of 
Captain John Smith, in Virginia, was the exploration of the Chicka- 
hominy River, in the hope that it might constitute a water-way to 
the Pacific Ocean ; and one of the next events in the history of the 
same colony was a mining excitement, such as would be called in our 
California tongue a “ stampede,” caused by the supposed discovery of 
gold ; in which, fortunately, John Smith did not avail himself of his 
official position to take “ stock.” It is a curious circumstance that gold 
really occurs in that region, though the glittering dust, of which a 
ship-load was sent by the deluded colonists to the jewelers of Lon¬ 
don, proved to be but mica or iron-pyrites; and it seems probable 
(albeit this suggestion is not based upon any explicit record known 
to me) that the presence of gold among the Indians, and the dis¬ 
covery of specimens of the quartz or slates of Virginia, containing 
visible particles of it, gave rise to the general excitement, under the 
influence of which, without further tests of value, a large amount of 
worthless material was collected, to the neglect of necessary and 
profitable industry. From this point of view the Jamestown mining 
fever was the prototype of many that have since occurred—all of 
which may be summed up in the general expression, that the mine 
“did not pan out according to the samples.” 

A more promising industry was inaugurated at the same time by 


4 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


the sending of a*quantity of iron ore from Jamestown to England 
in 1G08. This ore, smelted in England, yielded seventeen tons of 
metal, probably the first pig-iron ever made from North American 
ore. In 1620, a hundred and fifty skilled workmen were sent to 
the colony to erect iron-works; and it is said that a fund, subscribed 
for the education of the colonists and Indians, was invested in this 
enterprise, as a safe and sure means of increase. But, in 1622, an 
Indian massacre broke up the enterprise; and both the manufacture 
of iron and the education of citizens and Indians have been obliged, 
ever since, to rely upon other sources of support. 

For an interesting collection of facts relative to the beginnings of 
the iron industry of the American colonies, I refer you to the forth¬ 
coming work on that subject, by our fellow-member, Mr. John B. 
Pearse, to whose courtesy I am indebted for the opportunity to con¬ 
sult the advance sheets of a portion of the book. 

According to the statement of Colonel Spots wood, quoted by Mr. 
Pearse, it appears that, previous to 1724, neither New England, Penn¬ 
sylvania, nor Virginia, possessed blast furnaces. Their product of 
iron was from bloomeries only. According to Prof. Hodge, quoted 
by Prof. Whitney, however, a furnace was built at Pembroke, Mass., 
in 1702; and another authority states that, in 1721, New England 
possessed six furnaces and nineteen forges. In 1719 was passed the 
famous resolution of the British House of Commons, “that the erec¬ 
tion of manufactories in the colonies tended to lessen their depen¬ 
dency on Great Britain.” Only the earnest protest of the colonial 
agents prevented the prohibition at that time of the American iron 
manufacture. The next thirty years witnessed two instructive con¬ 
tests. The first was that of the colonial with the domestic pig-iron 
manufacture—a competition in which America was favored by the 
abundance of her vegetable fuel (the employment of mineral coal in 
iron-making not having yet found introduction), in comparison with 
the rapidly waning forests of Great Britain. The British manufac¬ 
ture being protected by heavy duties on colonial pig-iron, the latter 
began to be more and more worked up into bar-iron, nails, steel, etc., 
at home; and this brought on a new competition with the British 
manufacturers of these articles. In 1750, a further legislative at¬ 
tempt to regulate this trade was made by Parliament, which decreed 
the admission of colonial pig-iron duty free, but prohibited the erec¬ 
tion in America of slitting, rolling, or plating mills, or steel fur¬ 
naces, ordering that all new ones thereafter built should be suppressed 
as “ nuisances.” 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


0 


It will be recollected that arbitrary acts of this kind, for the de- 
struction of our infant manufactures, were among the grievances 
cited in the Declaration of Independence. The extent of the Ameri¬ 
can iron manufacture, during the ante-revolutionary period, can be 
inferred only from scanty records of exports. These, beginning in 
1717 with three tons, had increased, in 1 ( 50, to about 3000 tons ; 
in 1765, the total is reported at 4342 tons; and, in 1771, at 7525 
tons, the maximum annual export. The outbreak of the war of course 
put an end to exportation and caused a great demand for war ma¬ 
terial, which occupied and rapidly extended the means of manufac¬ 
ture possessed by the country. The expanded iron industry suffered 
a severe collapse when, at the close of the war, not only this demand 
ceased, but the reopened ports admitted large quantities of foreign 
iron—the successful employment of mineral coal, the steam engine 
and puddling having by that time laid the foundation of English 
supremacy in the iron manufacture. 

The earliest copper-mining company of which we find any record- 
according to Prof. Whitney, in his excellent work on the metallic 
wealth of the United States, the earliest incorporated mining com¬ 
pany of any kind—was chartered in 1709, to work the Simsbury 
mines, at Granby, Conn. These mines were abandoned in the middle 
of the eighteenth century, afterwards bought by the State of Con¬ 
necticut, and used as a prison for sixty years. Mining was resumed 
in them about 1830, and after a few years they were again abandoned. 
The ores were mostly shipped to England, and seem to have been 
lean. The deposit belongs to the class of irregular bunches, nodules, 
seams, or limited beds, in the New Red Sandstone, near its junction 
with trap. This formation was the scene in New Jersey, also, of 
early mining activity. The Schuyler mine, near Belleville, on the 
Passaic, was discovered about 1719, and proved more profitable fo 
its owners before the Revolution than it ever has been since that 
time, to any of the series of individuals and companies that have 
expended large sums in its development. In fact, the chief blessing 
conferred upon mankind by the Schuyler mine arises from the cir¬ 
cumstance that the first steam engine ever built wholly in America 
was constructed in 1793-4, at the small machine shop attached to 
the smelting works at Belleville, my father being the pattern-maker 
in the party of mechanics sent out by Boulton & Watt for the pur¬ 
pose of erecting an engine for the Philadelphia Water-works in 
Centre Square. In 1751 a copper mine was opened near New Bruns¬ 
wick ; and the Bridgewater mine, near Somerville, was operated pre- 


6 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


vious to the Revolution, though even then, it is said, with much loss 
of capital. New Jersey’s record in copper-mining is not a cheerful 
one; but her unsurpassed ranges of iron ores may well console her. 
Betrayed by the treachery of Triassic and trap, she can flee to the 
shelter of the crystalline schists. Pennsylvania was not without her 
copper-mining in the colonial period, the Gap mine, in Lancaster 
County, having been opened in 1732. 

Already during the colonial period the first red gleams of the 
future glory of the Lake Superior mines had appeared. The in¬ 
trepid Jesuit fathers, Marquette and others, who penetrated the 
wilderness from Acadia to the Gulf, to carry both the Cross of their 
religion and the Lillies of their Sovereign, had made extensive ex¬ 
plorations on the Upper Peninsula, and published glowing accounts 
of the abundance of copper, to which later travelers added legends 
of gold and precious stones. Before them, the Indian tribes, whose 
stone tools now furnish subjects of inquiry to the archeologist, had 
wrought rudely upon the deposits which nature had left in a condi¬ 
tion so exceptionally pure as not to need, for the production of 
limited amounts of metal, the intervention of metallurgical pro¬ 
cesses. The first recorded mining operations on the part of white 
men were those of Alexander Henry, near the Forks of the Onto¬ 
nagon, in 1771. As is well known, however, the active develop¬ 
ment of this region dates from the publication of Houghton’s Geo¬ 
logical Report , in 1841, and the extinguishment of the Chippewa 
title by the treaty of 1843. 

Lead mining in this country may also claim an ancient origin— 
as we reckon antiquity. As early as 1651, Governor John Winthrop 
received his famous license to work any mines of u lead, copper, or 
tin, or any minerals as antimony, vitriol, black-lead, alum, salt, salt- 
springs, or any other the like,” and “to enjoy forever said mines, 
with the lands, woods, timber, and water within two or three miles 
of said mines.” As he received also a special grant of mines or 
minerals in the neighborhood of Middletown, Conn., it is not un¬ 
likely that the old Middletown silver-lead mine, the date of the 
discovery of which is not precisely known, was opened by him or 
his successors. The nickel and cobalt mines near Chester, in Con¬ 
necticut, once held to be very promising deposits, are also believed 
to have been originally worked by Governor Winthrop; but nickel 
was not valuable in those days; and the lead and copper in these 
ores do not seem to have been abundant. Unfortunately, now that 
nickel and cobalt are so valuable as to repay amply the cost of ex- 


IX THE UNITED STATES. 


7 


tracting them when they are present in a small percentage only, 
these Connecticut ores no longer correspond (if indeed they ever 
did) to the analysis and accounts formerly given as to their niccolifer- 
ous character. 

The old Southampton silver-lead mine, in Massachusetts, well 
known to mineralogists, was commenced in 1765, by Connecticut 
adventurers; but its operations were suspended by the Revolution¬ 
ary war. Lead mines in Columbia and Dutchess Counties, N. Y., 
were also worked at an early period; and, no doubt, all over the 
country occupied or controlled during the war by the American 
forces, there were small and desultory surface operations, furnishing 
lead for the use of the armv. 

The Indians inhabiting the Mississippi Valley before the advent 
of the whites probably did not understand the metallurgy of lead. 
Galena has been found in the Western mounds, but, it is said, no 
lead. In 1700 and 1701 Pere Le Sueur made his famous voyage 
up the Mississippi, discovering, as lie claimed, many lead mines. 
Lead mining was begun in Missouri in 1720, while that country 
belonged to France, and under the patent granted to Law’s famous 
Mississippi Company. Mine la Motte, named after a mineralogist 
who came over with Renault, the superintendent, was one of the 
first discoveries. It has been in operation at intervals ever since, 
and is now successfully managed by Mr. Cogswell, a member of our 
Institute, who may, I think, truthfully claim that he has charge of 
the oldest mining enterprise still active in the United States. The 
ores yield a small percentage of nickel and cobalt, as well as lead. 

It was in 1788 that Dubuque obtained from the Indians the grant 
under which he mined until the year of his death, where the city 
now stands which bears his name. The land was subsequently 
ceded to the United States by the Indians, and the representatives 
of Dubuque were forcibly ejected. 

Such, then, was the condition of our mining industry at the com¬ 
mencement of our national existence. We occupied but a strip of 
territory on the Atlantic; and even in that limited area we had 
scarcelv learned the nature and extent of the mineral resources to 
be utilized. Anthracite and petroleum, quicksilver and zinc, were 
unknown as treasures within our reach. The rapid extension of 
possession, government, population, and industry over plains and 
mountains to the Pacific, which has been effected in a hundred years, 
is but the type of a conquest and progress which has advanced with 
equal rapidity in every department of human labor, and nowhere 


8 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


more notably than in the departments of mining and metallurgy. 
The tables which Dr. Raymond has prepared, and which will be 
printed to accompany these remarks, show that this country has 
produced during the century ending with 1875, of gold, about 
66,680,000 troy ounces, worth about §1,332,700,000; of silver, 
about 201,300,000 troy ounces, worth about §261,450,000 ; of quick¬ 
silver, 840,000 flasks, or 64,206,000 pounds avoirdupois; of copper, 
200,000 tons; of lead, 855,000 tons; of pig-iron, 40,000,000 tons; 
of anthracite coal, 351,521,423 tons (the ton in all these cases being 
2240 pounds avoirdupois); and of petroleum, 76,594,600 barrels. 
The product of these leading industries for the year 1875 were: 
gold, §33,400,000; silver, §41,400,000; quicksilver, 53,706 flasks; 
copper, 15,625 tons; lead, 53,000 tons; pig-iron, 2,108,554 tons; 
zinc, about 15,000 tons; anthracite, 20,643,509 tons; bituminous 
coal, about 26,000 tons; petroleum, 8,787,506 barrels. 

In order that a clear idea may be formed as to the relative posi¬ 
tion now held by the United States in the world of mining and 
metallurgy, I have selected the production of coal, which is the 
main reliance for power of all organized industry, and of iron, 
which is the chief agent of civilization, as the basis of comparison 
with other nations, using, so far as coal is concerned, the figures 
given in the 42d Annual Report of the Philadelphia Board of 
Trade, for the year 1873.*. 



Tons. 

Per cent 

Great Britain, 

. 127,016,747 

46.4 

U nited States, 

. 50,512,000 

18.4 

Germany, 

. 45,335,741 

16.5 

France,.... 

. 17,400,000 

6.4 

Belgium,- 

. 17,000,000 

6.2 

Adstria and Hungary, . 

. 11,000,000 

4.0 

Russia, .... 

1,200,000 

0.5 

Spain, .... 

570,000 

0.2 

Portugal, 

18,000 

— 

Nova Scotia, . 

1,051,567 

0.4 

Australia, 

1,000,000 

0.4 

India, .... 

500,000 

0.2 

Other countries, . 

1,000,000 

0.4 

Total. 

. 273,704,055 

100.0 


* I wish to acknowledge for these and other figures relating to coal, my obli¬ 
gations to Mr. R. P. Rothwell, who has freely placed at my disposal the very 
extensive and elaborate compilations of statistics which are to form the basis of 
an exhaustive paper by his experienced hand on that subject. 










IN THE UNITED STATES. 


9 


The following estimate, in round numbers, of the world’s present 
production of iron is taken from various sources, and may be con¬ 
sidered approximately correct. The figures for Great Britain and 
I ranee are those of 1874, and the product of the United States for 
the same year has been taken. For other countries the estimates 
are principally for 1871 or 1872, except Austria and Hungary, for 
which the official returns for 1873 have been taken. 

The quantities are given in tons of 2240 pounds. 


Groat Britain, ...... 

. 5,991,000 

Per cent. 

45.2 

United States,. 

. 2,401,000 

13.1 

Germany,....... 

. 1,600,000 

12.1 

France,. 

. 1,360,000 

10.3 

Belgium,.. 

570,000 

4.3 

Austria and Hungary, .... 

365,000 

2.7 

liussia,. 

360,000 

2.7 

Sweden and Norway, .... 

306,000 

2.3 

Italy,. 

73,000 

0.5 

Spain, .... ... 

73,000 

0.5 

Switzerland, ...... 

7,000 

— 

Canada,. 

20,000 

0.2 

South America, ..... 

50,000 

0.4 

Japan, ....... 

9,000 

0.1 

Asia, ....... 

40,000 

0.3 

Africa, ....... 

25,000 

0.2 

Australia,. 

10,000 

0.1 


13,260,000 

100.0 


An examination of these tables will serve to show that in the 
products which measure the manufacturing industry of nations, 
Great Britain stands first and the United States second on the roll, 
and that there is a clear and almost identical relation between the 
product of coal and the product of iron. The United States now 
produces as much coal and iron as Great Britain yielded in 1850. 
We are thus gaining steadily and surely upon our great progenitor, 
and in the nature of things, as the population of this country grows, 
must, before another century rolls around, pass far beyond her pos¬ 
sible limits of production, and become the first on the International 
list, because we have the greatest geographical extent, and our natu¬ 
ral resources are upon so vast a scale that all the coal area of all the 
rest of the world would only occupy one-fourth of the space in 
which, within our borders, are stored up the reserves of future 
power. 

In a hundred years, we have thus reached a point at which for 










10 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


coal, iron, gold, silver, copper, lead, and zinc, we are independent 
of the world, with abundant capacity to supply as well our growing 
wants, as to export these blessings of civilization to other and less 
favored lands, as soon as our labor and our legislation are adjusted 
to the conditions which will enable us to compete in foreign markets. 
One hundred years ago we proclaimed our political independence, 
and we maintained it by force of arms; we are now in a position to 
proclaim our industrial and commercial independence, and maintain 
it by the force of peaceful agencies against friendly competition. 

A striking view of this prosperous development is presented by 
the magnificent mineral collection under the charge of Prof. Blake, 
in the Government building at the neighboring Exposition—a col¬ 
lection which constitutes the first worthy National Museum of 
Mining and Metallurgy. 

Never was a century of free government celebrated under such 
favorable conditions, never was free government so justified by the 
material results it has produced. But let us not conceal from our¬ 
selves the fact that mere growth in wealth, mere development in 
* industry, mere increase in population are not the best evidences of 
national greatness; and unless our progress in art, learning, morals, 
and religion keeps pace with our material growth we have cause 
rather for humiliation than for glorification. 

a Whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, what¬ 
soever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things 
are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report” constitute the real 
glory of a nation, without which the magnificent material structure 
which in a century we have reared, will disappear “ like the baseless 
fabric of a vision.” 

In a hundred years, as I have said, we have reached a point at 
which, for every one of the minerals and metals named, we are inde¬ 
pendent of the world, having the capacity to supply our own growing 
domestic demand, and also to export to foreign lands. 

It is not my purpose to trace in detail the steps by which this de¬ 
gree of progress has been achieved. The narration of successive 
events alone, without any discussion of underlying causes and ac¬ 
companying effects, would consume far more time than I could com¬ 
mand. So far as the leading epochs of the history are concerned, I 
think they may be fairly summed up in the following mere catalogue: 

1. First of all, must be named the erection in Philadelphia, in 
1794, of the first steam engine in America. We celebrate this year 
the centennial anniversary of a greater power than the United States 


IN TIIE UNITED STATES. 


11 


of America—a wider revolution than our War of Independence. It 
was in 1776 that James M att presented to the world the perfected 
steam engine, all the improvements of which since his day are not 
to be compared with those which he devised upon the rude machines 
of his predecessors. In one hundred years, the steam engine has 
transformed the face of the world and affected to its remotest corners 
the condition of the human race. Few changes have been so pro¬ 
found ; not one in history has been so rapid and amazing. With 
reference to the special subject now under consideration, if I were 
asked what elements had most to do with the swift progress of our 
country, I should answer, freedom and the steam engine. But 
deeper even than any organized declarations or outward forms of 
freedom lies the influence of the steam engine, which has been from 
the day of its birth, in spite of laws and dynasties, and all accidents 
of history, the great emancipator of man. 

2. Gold Mining in the South. —Already Jefferson, in his Notes 
on Virginia , mentioned the finding of a lump of gold weighing 
seventeen pennyweights, near the Rappahannock; and, about the 
beginning of this century, the famous Cabarrus nugget, weighing 
twenty-eight pounds, was discovered at the Reed Mine, in North 
Carolina. But the great gold excitement in the South followed the 
discoveries in Georgia, from 1828 to 1830. The maximum of pro¬ 
duction (probably never more than §600,000 in any one year) was 
from 1828 to 1845, since which time it has declined to insignificance, 
though a few enterprises, both in hydraulic and quartz mining, are 
now actively prosecuted. 

3. The Opening of the Anthracite Coal Fields and the use of An¬ 
thracite in the Blast Furnace. —The first of these events practically 
dates from the year 1820, although some anthracite found its way to 
market much earlier, and the second from the year 1839. The 
latter was followed by the development of the vast anthracite iron 
industry, which has contributed so much to the prosperity of Penn¬ 
sylvania. The connection between anthracite and civilization was 
long ago pointed out by Sir Charles Lyell, in connection with his 
visit to this country, when he observed in this State, and in this 
very city where we now stand, the strange phenomenon of a vast 
manufacturing population, dwelling in neat houses and able to keep 
themselves and their houses clean. This smokeless fuel is a great 
moral and aesthetic benefactor. It has also proved specially useful 
in metallurgy—one process at least, the American zinc-oxide manu¬ 
facture, being impracticable without it, and in war no one will deny 


12 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


its superiority who remembers how our cruisers burning anthracite, 
and hence not traceable at sea by their smoke, were able to spy and 
pursue the blockade-runners, whose thick clouds of escaping bitu¬ 
minous smoke betrayed them. A table of the production of anthra¬ 
cite is given herewith; and some further observations concerning its 
control and management will be appropriate under another head of 
my remarks. 

4. The Use of Uciw Bituminous Coal in the Blast Furnace. —This 
was introduced in 1845. 

5. The Development of the Copper Mines of Lake Superior, begin¬ 
ning in 1845 and increasing slowly but steadily to 1862, when about 
eight thousand tons of ingot copper were produced; then declining 
for some years, to recover in 1868 and 1869 its lost ground, and 
since the latter year, by reason of the great production of the Calu¬ 
met and Hecla Mine, to attain an unprecedented yield. The tables 
of copper production for the United States, herewith given, show 
that our present product is not far from sixteen thousand tons, of 
which three-fourths must be credited to the Lake Superior mines. 

6. The Discovery of Gold in California, in 1848, or rather its redis¬ 
covery, since it had previously been known to both the natives and . 
the Jesuit missionaries, and also to hunters and trappers. The won¬ 
derful direct and indirect results of this event have been too often 
the theme of orators, historians, and political economists to need a 
further description from me. Its direct result in the way of mining 
was the rapid exploration of the Western territories by eager pros¬ 
pectors, and the successive development of placer-mines in nearly all 
of them. It is difficnlt to fix the dates of these beginnings; but we 
may assume with sufficient accuracy that gold mining practically 
began in Oregon in 1852, in Arizona in 1858, in Colorado in 1859, 
in Idaho and Montana in 1860. With the completer exploration of 
the country, and the decline of the placer-mines, stampedes have 
grown less frequent and extensive than in the earlier days. There 
is scarcely any corner of the country left, except the Black Hills of 
Dakota, which has not been ransacked sufficiently to show whether 
it contains extensive and valuable placer deposits; and those dis¬ 
tricts which present accumulations of gold in such a way as to offer 
returns immediately to labor without capital have been already over¬ 
run. The principal reliance of our gold-mining industry for the 
future must be quartz and hydraulic or deep gravel mines. These 
may be expected to maintain for years to come their present rate of 
production, if not to increase it. In the table of gold production, 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


13 


herewith given, there is, it is true, a falling off of late years; but 
this is to be attributed to the placer-mines. 

7. The Commencement , about 1851, of Regular Mining Operations 
at the New Almaden Quicksilver Mine , in California. —The produc¬ 
tion of this metal in the United States has been thus far confined to 
the State of California; and it will be seen from the table of the 
production of the New Almaden mine, that it has always furnished 
a large, though of late a waning, proportion of the grand total for the 
country. 

8. The middle of the nineteenth century was crowded with im¬ 
portant events in metallurgy and mining. It was in 1856 that Mr. 
Bessemer read his paper at the Cheltenham meeting of the British 
Association for the Advancement of Science, which inaugurated for 
both continents the age of steel. Within sixty days after that event 
an experimental Bessemer Converter was in readiness at the furnaces 
of Cooper & Hewitt, at Phillipsburg, New Jersey. But the experi¬ 
ment was not carried far enough to demonstrate the value of the 
newly-proposed process, and it was left to the late John A. Griswold 
and his associates to introduce and perfect this wonderful method in 
the United States. I speak more briefly on this point than its far- 
reaching importance deserves; but in the presence of one whose ac¬ 
quaintance with it is so profound, and whose services in relation to 
it have been so brilliant as those of our honored president, Mr. Hol¬ 
ley, and of so many gentlemen as I see before me who are worthily 
associated with him in its glorious history, I could afford to be silent 
altogether. 

9. The Commencement of the Hydraulic Mining Industry. —The 
position of the auriferous slates and quartz veins, on the west flank 
of the Sierra, with the precipitous mountains behind them, and the 
broad plain before, has favored exceptionally the formation of deep 
auriferous gravels in which California far exceeds any other known 
region. And the same topographical features furnish the two other 
prime requisites of hydraulic mining, namely, an abundant supply 
of water and a sufficient grade of descent to permit the use of flumes 
and the escape of tailings. These advantages the keen-witted miners 
of the Pacific coast were quick to make available; and I think we 
may set down the invention of hydraulic mining, which occurred, I 
believe, about 1853, as an epoch in the progress of American mining. 
It lias given us an entirely new and original branch of the art, in¬ 
volving many ingenious hydrodynamic and hydrostatic contrivances; 
and it has certainly made possible the exploitation of thousands 


14 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


upon thousands of acres of auriferous gravel which could not have 
been profitably handled in any other way. The mountain torrents 
of the Sierra, caught on their way to the Pacific, have been forced to 
pause and do the work of man. The same agencies that buried the 
gold among the clay and pebbles of the river-beds are now made to 
strip the covering from it and lay it bare again. The hydraulic 
mines produce, at present, not less than $10,000,000 or $12,000,000 
annually; and many enterprises of this kind which have been prose¬ 
cuted through years of expensive preparation, and are now just be¬ 
ginning to touch their harvests of profit, will add henceforward to the 
product. I may mention as an illustration the extensive operations 
of the North Bloomfield and its two allied companies in California, 
which have expended in works $3,500,000, and will have six 
deep tunnels, aggregating over 20,000 feet, and canals supplying 
100,000,000 gallons of water daily. 

10. We must turn for a moment to the East again, to note the 
commencement of iron mining at Lake Superior, about the year 
1856. The extraordinary pure and rich ores of the upper penin¬ 
sula of Michigan now find their way, to the extent of a million of tons 
per annum, in fleets of vessels across the lakes to Cleveland, and are 
thence distributed to the furnaces of Ohio and Pennsylvania. The 
similarly pure Missouri ores have built up in like manner their own 
market. The growth of the Lake Superior iron business is shown 
in the accompanying table. 

11. The next great event in the history of American mining was 
the discovery, in 1859, that the Comstock lode was rich in silver. 
This opened an era of activity and speculation which has scarcely 
ceased since that time. Single districts have been subjected to fluc¬ 
tuating experiences, passing from the first enthusiasm through all 
the stages of hope to reaction and despair; but though the fortunes 
of each have risen and fallen like the changing tide, it has nearly 
always been high water somewhere. Thus we have had a succession 
of favorites in the way of silver-mining districts, each one crowding 
its predecessor out of the public notice. Of these the following list 
includes the most permanently productive: In Nevada, the Union- 
ville, Reese River, Belmont, White Pine, Eureka, Esmeralda, and 
Pioche districts; in California, the argentiferous district of Inyo 
County; in Idaho, the Owyhee district; in Utah, the Cottonwood 
and Bingham districts; in Colorado, the silver districts of Clear 
Creek, Boulder, and Summit Counties, to which the latest favorite, 
the San Juan region, may be added. 1 have named those localities 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


15 


in which mining industry is still active and flourishing. There is a 
longer and a sadder list, the funereal effect of which I will not in¬ 
trude upon this festive occasion. But it ought to be remarked, that 
the apparent failure and abandonment of many districts heretofore 
does not argue their lack of prospective value. It is, on the con¬ 
trary, amazing that under the adverse conditions surrounding the 
industry of mining in regions “ remote, unfriended, solitary ”— 
though not “slow”—so many communities should have succeeded 
in taking permanent root. Too much is expected of this industry 
when it is required to supply the lack of labor, food, transportation, 
government, and the organized support which in settled societies all 
the trades and occupations give to each other. Pioneer work is full 
of peril and of waste; and in view of the wonderful results achieved 
by our pioneers in mining, it ill becomes us to sneer at the losses and 
failures which constitute the inevitable cost of such conquests. When 
the battle has been gloriously won, and the spoils of victory are ours, 
we do not greatly mourn over the number of bullets that may have 
been fired in vain. 

But through all the vicissitudes of silver mining in other districts, 
the Comstock mines have maintained their place, an instance of rapid 
exploitation, and of aggregated wealth of production unexampled in 
history. Here, too, there have been intervals of failing hope; but a 
new bonanza has always made its appearance before the resources at 
hand were entirely exhausted; and we have seen extracted from the 
ores of this one vein, during the past fifteen years, the round sum of 
$200,000,000 in gold and silver. Dr. Raymond, in the table here¬ 
with given, assumes the product of gold to have been (on the au¬ 
thority of Mr. Hague) about 40 per cent, of the entire value. We 
have, therefore, from the Comstock mines during the period named, 
$80,000,000 gold, and $120,000,000 silver. 

The swift development of these mines, and the active commence¬ 
ment, about the same time, of deep quartz mining operations in 
California led to a remarkable progress in mining machinery, and to 
the perfection of two distinctively American processes. I refer to the 
California stamp mill and amalgamation process for gold, and the 
Washoe pan-process for silver. Neither of these is so novel in prin¬ 
ciple as the hydraulic process of gold mining already mentioned; 
but both of them have received the peculiar impress of an ingenuity 
and mechanical skill, partly innate in our national character, and 
partly the product of the stern pressure of economic necessities. 
Into the fruitful field of further metallurgical improvements born of 


16 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


our Western mining industry—or adopted by it—such as the Blake 
rock-breaker, the Stetefeldt roasting furnace, the Bruckner cylinder, 
the Plattner chlorination, and many others less widely known, I 
cannot enter here. Our people have advanced in this line with 
headlong energy, and accomplished great results—at great expense. 
Much, undoubtedly, remains to be done; and it may be hoped that 
future progress will be equally rapid, but less costly. The intro¬ 
duction, three or four years ago, of the smelting processes of Europe 
for the treatment of the silver ores of the West, is a striking and 
encouraging instance of the quickness of our mining communities to 
seize upon the advantages of experience elsewhere, as soon as they 
are brought to notice. The ignorance which has led to many disas¬ 
ters in such enterprises, was not voluntary or obstinate. Give our 
people light, and they do. not keep their eyes shut. I am assured 
that already the smelting works of the West present many features 
of interest and suggestiveness even to the eyes of our skilful col¬ 
leagues from abroad. 

12. I may be permitted, in closing this imperfect review, to refer 
to the great improvements in mining machinery, in rock-drilling, in 
explosives, in the use of gaseous fuel, in the construction and man¬ 
agement of blast furnaces, puddling furnaces, rolling mills, and 
other branches of the iron manufacture, which have crowded upon 
us during the last ten years. It is impossible here to give even an 
enumeration of them which shall do them justice. They have been 
worthily commemorated in many papers before the Institute. With 
regard to one of them, the Martin process for the manufacture of 
open-hearth steel, I may speak with some personal satisfaction, since 
I had the privilege of introducing it into this country, after studying 
its merits in 1867 abroad. I am convinced that it has a great future, 
as the ally, if not the rival, of the Bessemer process. 

Returning now to the contemplation of the general field over 
which we have passed, we may inquire what the Government of the 
United States has done, with regard to the mining industry. Other 
nations have elaborate mining codes and bureaus of administration. 
In comparison with these, the meagerness of our governmental su¬ 
pervision of mining is remarkable; yet, in view of the progress I 
have sketched, may it not be possible that our system has been on 
the whole the best for us? Certainly a complicated mining code 
like that of Spain and Mexico, whatever it may have brought to the 
coffers of the State, seems to have conferred, in centuries of operation, 
little benefit upon the people. 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


17 


The common law of England is the foundation of our jurispru¬ 
dence in this, as in so many other respects. According to that law, 
as laid down in a noted case in the reign of Elizabeth, all gold or 
silver ores belonged to the crown, whether in private or public 
lands; but any ores containing neither gold nor silver belonged to 
the proprietor of the soil. Apart from the claims of the crown, the 
property in minerals is, according to the common law, prima facie 
in the owner of the fee of the land, but the property in minerals, or 
the right to search for them, may be vested in other persons by 
alienation, prescription, or custom. Since the two latter rights re¬ 
quire an origin beyond the time of legal memory, they are practi¬ 
cally out of the question in this country. The crown right to the 
precious metals, as declared in the case referred to, was a survival or 
remainder of the royalty claimed in ancient times by the sovereign 
over all minerals. This sweeping claim, born of the despotisms of 
the Orient and made the subject of much conflict among emperors, 
feudal lords, and municipal authorities during the middle ages, 
dwindled at last till it covered only gold and silver. But it disap¬ 
peared entirely from English America, for the simple reason that 
there was no private land ownership in this country, and the sover¬ 
eign of England claimed, by right of discovery, soil and metals 
alike, barring only the Indian title, which it was his exclusive priv¬ 
ilege (or that of his authorized representatives or grantees) to ex¬ 
tinguish. After the Revolution, the United States succeeded to the 
rights of the British crown, and by the treaty of peace and the sub¬ 
sequent cessions by the different States of their colonial claims upon 
the public lands, the federal government became possessed of a vast 
domain over which, after extinguishing the Indian title, it had com¬ 
plete control. In the territories subsequently acquired from France 
and Spain, the United States assumed the rights and obligations of 
those sovereigns; and this circumstance, particularly in the adjust¬ 
ment of Spanish mineral and agricultural grants, has caused some 
apparent variations from the general policy. But it is sufficiently 
accurate to say that at the present time, throughout the country, the 
owner of the fee, or the party who has obtained from him by lease 
or purchase the mineral right, has supreme control. The mining 
legislation of the United States, therefore, is simply a part of the 
administration of the public lands ; and for this reason it is executed 
by the Commissioner of the General Land Office. 

In 1807 an act was passed, relating primarily to the lead-bearing 
lands of Illinois. They were ordered to be reserved from sale, and 


18 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


leased to miners by the war department. The leases covered tracts 
at first three miles square (afterward reduced to one mile), and bound 
the lessee to work the mines with due diligence and return to the 
United States G per cent, of all the ores raised. “No leases were is¬ 
sued under this law,” says Professor Whitney, “ until 1822, and but 
a small quantity of lead was raised, previous to 1826, from which 
time the production began to increase rapidly. For a few years the 
rents were paid with tolerable regularity ; but, after 1834, in conse¬ 
quence of the immense number of illegal entries of mineral land at 
the Wisconsin Land Office, the smelters and miners refused to make 
any further payments, and the government was entirely unable to 
collect them. After much trouble and expense, it was, in 1847 
finally concluded that the only way was to sell the mineral land, and 
do away with all reserves of lead or any other metal, since they had 
only been a source of embarrassment to the department.” 

Meanwhile, by a forced construction (afterwards declared invalid) 
of the same act, hundreds of leases were granted to speculators in 
the Lake Superior copper region, which was, from 18-43 to 1846, the 
scene of wild and baseless excitement. The bubble burst during; the 
latter year; the issue of permits and leases was suspended as illegal, 
and the act of 1847, authorizing the sale of the mineral lands, and 
a geological survey of the district, laid the foundation of a more 
substantial prosperity. 

This policy of selling the mineral lands has been that of the 
government ever since. But it has necessarily been modified in the 
West by the peculiar circumstances under which that region has 
been settled. Before lands can be sold they must be surveyed; and 
before they can be sold as mineral lands, their mineral-bearing char¬ 
acter must be ascertained. Our miners and explorers overran and 
occupied the Pacific slope in advance of the public surveys. They 
built cities that were not shown on any map; they cut timber, turned 
water-courses, dug canals, tunneled mountains, bought and sold their 
rights to these improvements under laws established by themselves, 
and enforced by public sentiment only. For nearly twenty years 
the government looked on, without asserting its dominant ownership 
of the public lands; and when by the acts of 1866, 1870, and 1872, 
and other minor enactments, a general system was created, it was 
necessary to recognize as far as possible the rights which had grown 
up by general consent, and to seek only to give to them certainty, 
practical uniformity, and reasonable limitations. It is not my pur¬ 
pose to discuss in detail the mining laws of the United States, or to 
trace the curiously complicated origins of the local customs on which 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


19 


they are largely based. Suffice it to say that the system recognizes 
the English common law principle, that the mineral right passes 
with the fee to the lands; so that, in the words of the commissioner 
(July 10th, 1873) “all mineral deposits discovered upon land, after 
United States patent therefor has issued to a party claiming under the 
laws regulating the disposal of agricultural lands, pass with the patent, 
and the Land Office has no further jurisdiction in the premises.” 

But the principle is also recognized that the mineral right may be 
separated from the fee by the owner, whether he be an individual or 
the United States ; and this principle is curiously applied in the form 
of patents for mining claims upon lodes, which, following the form 
of the possessory title, grant to the patentee the right to follow all 
veins, the top or apex of which lies within the exterior boundaries 
of his claim, downward to any depth, though they pass under the 
surface of the land adjoining. 

As the size and the price per acre of the tracts sold under the 
agricultural laws are different from those to which the mining laws 
apply, and as, under the homestead law, a certain amount of agri¬ 
cultural land may be obtained without any payment, it is evident, 
that no known mineral deposits can be acquired under the agricul¬ 
tural laws; and this reservation is enforced both in the preliminary 
proceedings and in the patents finally issued under those laws. 

With regard to the mineral lands, however, it is certain that the 
patent for a claim carries with it both the fee of the land and also a 
mineral right, though not the same mineral right as is contemplated 
by the common law; since it is enlarged on the one hand by the 
permission to follow mineral deposits beneath the surface of adjoin¬ 
ing land, and limited on the other hand by the operation of the same 
permission in favor of the adjoining owner. The latter limitation 
is incorporated in agricultural patents also, and may become opera¬ 
tive whenever they adjoin mining patents. 

Previous to the application for a patent, the law permits free ex¬ 
ploration and mining upon the public lands to all citizens and those 
who have declared their intention to become such. The rights of 
this class of miners, under what is known as the possessory title, are 
regulated by local laws and customs, subject only to a few simple 
conditions, which the United States enforces upon all, and which 
chiefly concern the maximum size of individual claims, the definite 
character of their boundaries and landmarks, and a certain quantity 
of labor which must be bestowed upon them annually, in order to 
maintain possession. I will not pause to state the different features 
which these conditions present for lode and placer claims. It is 


20 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


sufficient to say that the miner, conforming to them, and thus main¬ 
taining his possessory title, may, after a certain expenditure, and 
upon due application, survey, and advertisement, in the absence of 
any valid opposing claim, perfect his purchase from the Govern¬ 
ment, receive his patent, and be thereafter free from the necessity of 
performing any given annual amount of labor to hold his claim. 
There are features in the present law concerning the rights of pros¬ 
pecting tunnels which seem both obscure and unwise; and some seri¬ 
ous questions remain to be settled as to the precise meaning of the 
law in these and other respects; but these we must pass by. 

Looking at the legislation on this subject as a whole, we see that 
it is confined to one department—that of title. The whole system 
is devised to facilitate the purchase of the mines by citizens. They 
are freely permitted to work them experimentally, but it is made 
their interest to buy them. No inspection, no police regulation, no 
technical control, is exercised by the Government. 

Turning to the State and Territorial Legislatures, we find that 
they have, in some cases, provided for inspecting mines, in the in¬ 
terest of the safety of workmen. Perhaps the best law of this kind 
is that of Pennsylvania, in which State the peculiar perils of coal¬ 
mining have forced the Legislature to take measures of protection. 
But we find nowhere such a technical control of mining as is ex¬ 


hibited in many European States, where the Government requires 
of the miner that he shall not waste wantonly or ignorantly the 
resources which, once exhausted, will never grow again. Our peo¬ 
ple waste as much as they like, and no one interferes. Admitting 
that this is an evil, it still remains a matter of doubt how far, under 
the circumstances of our particular case, the supervision of authority 
could remedy it. For my own part, though inclined to restrict as 
far as possible the functions of government, I am not disposed to 
say that for so great an end as the conservation of the mineral wealth 
of the country, it may not properly enforce some measures of econ¬ 
omy, with as good right as it may forbid the reckless waste of tim¬ 
ber or the slaughter of game out of season. But, in our nation, at 
least, governmental interference is the last resort, and a poor substi¬ 
tute for other causes, which, in the atmosphere of freedom and intel¬ 
ligence, ought to be effective. We are, perhaps, in our material 
career as a nation, like the young man who has “sown his wild 
oats,” and now, by mature reflection and the lessons of experience, is 
likely to be better restrained than by the hand of parental authority. 

Permit me, in drawing my remarks to a close, to suggest two 
agencies which seem to me to be co-operating already, and to open 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


21 


still wider future prospect, for the steady social and economical im¬ 
provement of our mining and metallurgical industry. 

The first of these is the spread of knowledge on these subjects 
throughout the country. Under this head we must recognize the 
great importance of that series of explorations of our great Western 
domain, which was recommended by Mr. Lincoln, with sublime 
faith in the salvation of his country, in the midst of the civil war, 
and which has been, by the liberality of the Government, prosecuted 
under various departments ever since. I need hardly make special 
mention, in addition, of the reports of the Commissioner of Mining 
Statistics, which have appeared annually since 1866 , and have re¬ 
flected upon our own community the light of the gathered technical 
knowledge of the world, while they have in turn exhibited to the 
world the resources and the progress of America. Such works as 
these, together with the technical periodicals and the occasional vol¬ 
umes, translated or original, which have come from the American 
press, have contributed already a great deal to the education of our 
mining communities. The government has not done too much in 
this direction; but it seems to me that it should continue this most 
necessary and proper work in a more systematic and uniform way. 
There ought to be no conflict of authorities, no duplication of work, 
no unnecessary expenditure of labor and money in the face of a task 
so great. 

Next in order, I may rank the influence of the technical schools. 
The number of these has rapidly increased during the past ten 
years; and I venture to say that many of them compare favorably, 
in theoretical instruction at least, and several of them in the appa¬ 
ratus of instruction, with the famous schools of the old world. The 
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, at Boston; the School of 
Mines of Columbia College, at New A r ork; the Sheffield Scientific 


School of Yale College, at New Haven; the Stevens Institute of 
Technology, at Hoboken; the Pardee Scientific Department of La¬ 
fayette College, at Easton; the excellent school at Rutgers College, 
under the direction of Prof. Cook; the new Scientific Department of 
the College of New Jersey; the School of Mining and Metallurgy of 
Lehigh University, at Bethlehem; the School of Mining and Prac¬ 
tical Geology of Harvard University, at Cambridge; the Scientific 
Department of the University of Pennsylvania, in this city; the 
School of Mines of Michigan University, at Ann Arbor; the Missouri 
School of Mines and Metallurgy, at Rolla; the Polytechnic Depart¬ 
ment of Washington University at St. Louis; and the similar depart¬ 
ment of the University of California, at Oakland; and perhaps some 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


09 

others which I have omitted to name—this is a list of schools for in¬ 
struction in the sciences involved in mining and metallurgical prac¬ 
tice, of which we need not be ashamed. What our schools undoubt¬ 
edly need, is a more intimate relation with practice. But this theme 
I need not touch. It has been ably and amply discussed at the joint 
meeting last night of the two bodies most fully aware of all its bear¬ 
ings. 

One more agency of the spread of technical knowledge deserves 
special mention. I refer to the influence of societies like the Insti¬ 
tute of Mining Engineers. The five years 7 activity of this Institute 
has impressed upon the professions which it represents a spirit of 
union, an enthusiasm of progress, a mutual recognition of the claims 
of theory and practice, which cannot be too highly estimated. Per¬ 
fect our schools as much as we may, the association of the young en¬ 
gineer with experienced engineers, the contact of his mind with ma¬ 
ture minds, their recognition of his merit, their correction of his 
errors, constitute the necessary supplement to the school-training. 
The average man, at least, should not be left to wrestle with his pro¬ 
fessional career alone. He will make better progress and take more 
pleasure in it, if he calls to his aid the element of social sympathy, 
and the intellectual reinforcement expressed in the proverb, “many 
heads are better than one.’ 7 

One further consideration, and I have done. The effect of grow¬ 
ing intelligence and knowledge in improving our methods of in¬ 
dustry would come short of some great ends if it operated only 
through the self-interest of the individual. Many reforms are be¬ 
yond the power of the individual; some are not even to his interest. 
Thus the miner under a possessory title on a gold-bearing quartz 
vein in Colorado may know that with a greater investment of capi¬ 
tal he could manage to reduce his losses of gold in extraction; but 
the capital may be wanting; or, he may know that by robbing the 
mine of its richest ores only, and allowing it to cave, he is probably 
destroying more valuable resources than he utilizes; but the mine is 
only temporarily his, and he prefers quick gains to permanent ones. 
So long as the anthracite lands of Pennsylvania were leased to count¬ 
less small operators, who paid royalty only on the coal which they 
sent to market, it was useless to explain to them that they wasted a 
third of the coal in the ground, and another third in the breaker, or 
that they ruined thousands of acres of coal-beds, overlying those 
which they recklessly worked. If there were no natural remedy for 
this wicked waste of the reserved force upon which the future pros¬ 
perity and comfort of mankind depend, it would be the highest duty 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


23 


of Government promptly to take into its own hands the direction 
and management of the mines of coal which society holds in trust 
for the future; but already it is easy to detect the operation of a new 
social law developed within the memory of man, but the fruit of the 
preparation of the ages during which society has been slowly built 
up, and matured into its present form and conditions. 

To the philosophic observer, the controlling law which runs 
through the whole history of man, down to the present century, is 
the law of dispersion, diffusion, distribution, the centrifugal social 
force, so to speak, which by its irresistible power has tended not 
merely to scatter mankind over the face of the habitable globe, but 
through what are termed civilizing and Christianizing agencies to 
place communities and individuals upon the common plane of equal 
rights in the domain of nature and before the law. 

From the time of the confusion of tongues at the Tower of Babel, 
through the long history of the early Oriental Empires, which re¬ 
duced society to the rule of order and then broke up into fragmen¬ 
tary political organizations, retaining, nevertheless, the principles of 
cohesion acquired by bitter experience; through the Greek and Ro¬ 
man imperial political structures upon which were ingrafted the 
civilization and the religion which their downfall made the common 
heritage of the northern barbarians who came for destruction, but 
were themselves transformed into the apostles of a more liberal and 
enlightened social organization, this law of dispersion has never 
ceased to exercise its power and its supremacy. The very inven¬ 
tions of man are only so many proofs of the unceasing operation of 
this law. In warfare, gunpowder and firearms merely enlarged 
the area over which it was possible to carry on military operations; 
the magnetic compass only widened the field of commerce; the print¬ 
ing-press and the telegraph are merely agencies for the diffusion of 
thought; the steam engine is but a means whereby it becomes possi¬ 
ble to establish local industries in every part of the habitable globe; 
and the canal and the railway are essentially distributers of the 
products and the wealth of the human race. 

Although there is an impression abroad that this age is one of 
growing concentration of property, no man can study the history 
and the facts of the development of society without coming to the 
conclusion that at no period has there been so general and equal a. 
distribution of rights and property as in the present age. The de¬ 
struction of the feudal system was, in reality, the establishment of 
a new and better theory, in regard to the ownership of land, which 



24 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


through the convulsions of a revolution; in the more general distri¬ 
bution of landed property in Germany, and in that steady, remark¬ 
able, and successful agitation in England, which is now showing its 
results in the limitation of entail, the simplification of transfer, the 
enlargement of the suffrage, and the acquisition of small freeholds, 
whereby political power is being slowly but surely transferred from 
the great landholders to the middle classes of the most powerful and 
compact political organization which the world has ever seen. 

While, then, there is thus an unmistakable progress in the world 
towards a jlister and more general distribution of the control of the 
resources of nature and of the fruits of human industry, the present 
century has, undoubtedly, developed a new and remarkable central¬ 
izing tendency, which might be denominated the centripetal indus¬ 
trial force. I speak of the application of the corporate principle to 
the management of industrial enterprises, producing a concentration 
of property and management through the diffusion of ownership. 
Under the corporate system, the number of owners may be unlimited, 
but the management is necessarily confined to a few hands. It is 
the political idea of representation applied to industrial enterprises; 
it is the common wealth in its industrial, and not its political sense, 
which is concentrated for the material wants and progress of the 
human race. Now, this law of universal ownership, under limited 
management, heretofore applied with marked success during the 
latter half of the present century to great manufacturing establish¬ 
ments in this country, and of late in Europe, and of necessity to 
railroads everywhere, has at length, by slow but irresistible steps, 
taken possession of the great mining enterprises of the United States, 
and to-day has its strongest and most interesting development in the 
anthracite coal region, which may be said to be monopolized by six 
great corporations, administered by.a very small number of able offi¬ 
cers representing a vast body of owners who rely upon steady but 
not excessive dividends for their support. It is the fashion to de¬ 
nounce these corporations as monopolizers, but it is only the thought¬ 
less who do not investigate below the surface, who take this view of 
what is really the most interesting and suggestive application in our 
day of a powerful and irresistible force originating in the very heart 
of the social fabric. The monopoly is not the monopoly of owner¬ 
ship, for everybody is free to buy and sell, and there is no day when 
a man with money may not, at its value, procure a share in these 
enterprises. And no one familiar with business will pretend that 
the profits have been out of proportion to the cost and the risk of 
the undertakings, and no more conclusive answer, to any complaint 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


25 


on the score of monopoly can be made, than that to-day the shares 
in these corporations, in many cases, are selling below the original 
money cost. These corporations are, in fact, not the creators, but 
the outgrowth of a new and beneficent principle, which has begun 
to assert itself in society, and will continue to grow in power until 
the end of time. This principle is the practical association of dif¬ 
fused capital, through the agency of corporate organization, with 
labor, for the promotion of economy, for the improvement of pro¬ 
cesses, and for the general welfare of mankind. 

The capital is derived from innumerable sources, just as the little 
rills, finally, through streams and rivers, constitute the great ocean. 
The laborer himself may thus be the capitalist, and the capitalist 
may thus be the laborer, each taking his share of that portion of the 
fund which is appropriated to labor and to capital, and often in a 
double capacity taking a share from both. 

In its perfect and ultimate development it embodies the Christian 
idea of “ having all things in common,” yet “ rendering unto Caesar 
the things that are Caesar’s.” 

The rate of profit which may be derived from these great enter¬ 
prises, subject as they are to the scrutiny, criticism, and judgment 
of the public, in an age when nothing escapes notice, and all rights 
and property are virtually subordinated to the popular will, can 
never be excessive, for two reasons: on the one side the public will 
inevitably demand lower prices for an article of primary consequence 
in every household, and these corporations, creatures of the public 
will as they are, could not successfully resist such a demand, based 
upon excessive or unreasonable profits. On the other hand, when¬ 
ever the dividends rise above a reasonable rate of compensation, the 
laborers engaged in the production of coal, from whom these profits 
cannot be concealed, will justly claim, and rightfully secure, a larger 
share of the fruits of their labor. The checks upon any unreason¬ 
able exercise of the power conferred by the ownership under limited 
management of the anthracite coal-fields, are in reality so powerful 
that the public have nothing to fear from this cause, but the corpo¬ 
rations have rather reason to dread that they may not have justice 
at the hands of the public and the working classes. This justice 
they can only hope to secure by the wisest, best, and most economi¬ 
cal management and administration of the property they control, 
and whatever profits they may hereafter derive and be allowed to 
divide among the owners, will be rather due to the economies which 
they may be able to introduce, whereby the article is furnished at 


26 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


the lowest possible rate, than to any fancied monopoly which they 
may have in the coal itself, or in its transportation to market. 

Already, by the application of adequate capital, guided by the 
largest experience and the highest technical skill, the anthracite coal¬ 
mines, from being worked in a wasteful and extravagant manner, are 
being rapidly put in the best possible shape for the economical de¬ 
livery of coal at the surface, and for the preservation of every por¬ 
tion of the store upon which the future value of the property must 
depend. But besides economy in mining and care in preserving, 
there must be regularity and stability in the operations of the mine. 
There can be no real profit where these operations are subject to con¬ 
stant interruption, caused by strikes or other artificial impediments. 
The loss of interest on the plant at the mines, and in the lines of 
transportation caused by any serious stoppage to the works, would, 
of itself, be sufficient to render investments of this kind unprofit¬ 
able. Hence the out-put must be regulated and proportioned to the 
wants of the market. But this regulation must be continuous and 
not spasmodic. To enable this to be done, large stocks of coal must 
necessarily be kept on hand, in order that any sudden demand may 
be properly met without any serious increase in price; and in dull 
times the accumulation and restoration of the stocks will give steady 
employment to the miners, to whose families any cessation of work 
is a calamity of the most serious character, and to society an unmiti¬ 
gated evil. To insure continuous operations, the best relations must 
exist between the corporate owners and the laborers in their employ. 
It is notorious that throughout the coal regions these relations have 
been of the most unsatisfactory character, resulting, at often-recur¬ 
ring intervals, in strikes and lock-outs, which have no redeeming 
feature, but, on the contrary, have raised the price of coal to the 
consumer, have impaired the dividends of the owners, and have re¬ 
duced the working men and their families to a condition of suffering 
and demoralization, appalling to every well-wisher of his race. It 
is fortunate, therefore, that the interests of all classes concur in the 
prevention of these destructive and demoralizing collisions, and 
that the owners of the property, for their own self-protection, will 
be driven to remove the causes which have produced them. It is 
idle for them to expend their capital for the best machinery, for the 
highest skill, for the most economical transportation, unless they 
can, at the same time, insure a continuous production from a con¬ 
tented laboring population. 

This they have it in their power to do. If the same spirit of 
sacrifice which has sent out our missionaries into every heathen land, 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


27 


had been shown in the coal regions, and the same efforts had been 
made to establish and maintain the school-house, the church, and 
above all the Sunday-school, which have borne such fruits elsewhere 
in this broad land; if the hospital for the sick, and the comfortable 
refuge for the unfortunate had been carefully provided; if reading- 
rooms and night-schools, and rational places of amusement had, from 
the outset, been maintained for a growing and restless population, 
the coal regions to-day might have been a paradise upon earth in¬ 
stead of a disgrace to civilization. And here it is that this new 
power of concentrated management can exert itself with sure and 
absolute success. The appropriation of a few cents per ton on the 
coal mined to the work of improving the moral and intellectual 
conditions of the miners and their families will, in a time incredibly 
short, change the whole face of society in the coal regions. 

To be effective, however, this consecration of a fixed amount on 
each ton of coal sent to market must be as absolute and final as that 
portion of the proceeds which is devoted to pumping the mines, or 
driving the gangways. It must not come from grace, but from a 
sense of duty involved in the ownership of property, and dictated 
by a wise regard for its preservation and permanent value. Even 
if this percentage w T ere added to the price of the coal the addition 
would not be grudged by the public; but in fact no such addition 
could possibly occur, as there is no surer way of promoting economy 
in the cost of production than by improving the social condition, the 
self-respect, and the intelligence of those who are engaged in the 
work of production, which thus becomes continuous and systematic. 
Until the great companies thus recognize the duties, the responsibil¬ 
ities, and the opportunities for good, which are offered by the new 
social development which has rendered their existence a necessity as 
well as a possibility, they must not complain that they are regarded 
with distrust, and as enemies, both by the public which consumes 
their products, and by the working classes who see in them only 
grasping employers without a conscience. What individual owners 
could not do, it is easy for these great companies to put in practice; 
but the effort must be as earnest and serious as is the business of 
producing the coal and getting it to market. The very best talent 
' must be secured for the organization and management of the various 
agencies necessary for the moral, intellectual, and social improve¬ 
ment of the working classes, who must be themselves associated in 
the administration of the fund created and expended for their bene¬ 
fit. Five cents per ton would produce an annual revenue of over 
§1,000,000 applicable to this necessary and noble use, and five years 


28 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


of its intelligent and conscientious administration would convert 
what in some regions lias been aptly termed a “hell upon earth ” 
into a terrestrial paradise which would be the pride and the glory of 
the new world. 

What more fitting celebration of the Centennial year of American 
Independence could be possibly suggested or devised, or how could 
the advent of the incoming century be better signalized, than by the 
foundation on the part of the great anthracite coal companies of a 
new department in their administration for the moral, mental, social, 
and physical improvement of the workingmen and their families, 
and by the appropriation of a fixed charge on coal for this purpose. 
Let each of them select a well-paid and competent agent to devote 
himself to this work; let the various agencies be wisely organized 
and surely perfected, and there will be realized one of the greatest 
triumphs of that gospel which proclaimed, “Peace on earth, and 
good-will towards men.” The example thus set will soon extend 
itself to other industries, and to every branch of business which can 
adapt the corporate principle of the concentration of management 
through diffusion of ownership, the result of which will be that the 
strange phenomenon, now felt throughout the civilized world, of a 
general glut of products in the face of general want of them, will 
never again be witnessed; because, when the working classes, through 
the diviner agencies of Christian effort, shall have constant employ¬ 
ment, and adequate compensation, the sure results of general en light- 
enment and a cultivated conscience in the use of property, the power 
of consumption, now so far in arrear, will surely overtake the power 
of production, and re-establish the equation which nature intended 
to subsist between them. Thus may be realized that Christian 
commonwealth which has been the dream of the patriot, the philan¬ 
thropist, and the statesman, in all ages, in which every man who is 
willing to work shall find employment, and in which the products of 
industry will be so distributed that every man shall feel that he has 
received his fair share of them ; in which there will be neither abject 
and hopeless poverty on the one hand, nor superfluous riches on the 
other, because the problem of how to distribute capital through the 
concentration of management will have been fully solved and be 
thoroughly comprehended by all classes in the community ; in which 
the quaint questions put by Sir Thomas More, three hundred and 
sixty years ago, will at length have been answered, and his sug¬ 
gestive commentary thereon have lost its significance. 

.“Is not that government both unjust and ungrateful, that is so 
prodigal of its favors to those that are called gentlemen or gold- 


IN THE UNITED STATES. 


29 


smiths, or such others who are idle, or live either by flattery, or by 
contriving the arts of vain pleasure; and on the other hand takes 
no care of those of a meaner sort, such as ploughmen, colliers, and 
smiths, without whom it could not subsist? 

u But after the public has reaped all the advantages of their 
service, and they come to be oppressed with age, sickness, and want, 
all their labors, and the good they have done is forgotten, and all 
the recompense given them is, that they are left to die in great 
misery. The richer sort are often endeavoring to bring the hire of 
laborers lower, not only by their fraudulent practices, but by the 
laws which they procure to be made to this effect, so that though it 
is a thing most unjust in itself to give such small rewards to those 
who deserve so well of the public, yet they have given those hard¬ 
ships the name and color of justice, by procuring laws to be made 
for regulating them.” 

Although I quote from the Utopia , let it not be supposed that 
there is anything Utopian or impracticable in the proposition which 
I have advanced. It seems to me to be the next great step to be 
taken for the amelioration of the condition of mankind. The law 
of diffusion which thus far has governed the progress of the human 
race toward a higher and better plane of civilization, has at length 
made an effective lodgment in the domain of capital, whereby it is 
rendered capable of infinite division without impairing, but in effect 
improving the economy and force of its administration. The re¬ 
proach that “ corporations have no souls,” must, and will, next be 
removed, so soon as the beneficent possibilities inherent in these 
agencies shall be generally recognized, and those who are called to 
the management shall see that because capital is aggregated, the 
primary law on which all property rests, that it is a trust to be 
administered for the public good, loses none of its force, but can, in 
reality, only assert itself in all its vigor when concentrated manage¬ 
ment is brought to bear upon great aggregations of capital. Man 
did not become a “ living soul” until God breathed into him the 
breath of life. So corporations are mere machines until they are 
inspired by the associated conscience of society, to which they can 
give ready and effective expression, and I look for this expression 
first from the great coal companies, because their property and their 
peculiar organizations make it easy as w^ell as profitable for them to 
put in practice the fundamental idea, that a fixed portion of the 
proceeds of industry should be invariably devoted to the social 
improvement of those who labor directly for its development. 

If the seed here dropped should take root, as I pray and believe 


30 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


it will, then indeed will the country and the world have reason to 
rejoice at the industrial development of the last hundred years, and 
the celebration of this Centennial be the dawn of a better day for the 
•patient sons of toil, who, let it be confessed, with all frankness and 
humility, have not yet been endowed with their fair share of the 
good things of this goodly earth. 


Table of Production of Leading Metals and Minerals in the United States during 
the First Century of National Independence. Prepared byji. W. Raymond. 


• 

Anthracite, 
in tons of 
2240 lbs. 
avoir. 

Pig-iron, 
in tons of 
2240 fbs. 
avoir. 

Lead, 
in tons of 
2240 lbs. 
avoir. 

1819 

18 000* 



1820 

1,965 



1821 

3,273 



1822 

4’940 



1823 

9'023 



1824 

13,641 


4,432* 

1825 

38,499 


1,281 

1826 

54,815 


1,771 

1827 

71,167 

2,178,239* 

3,927 

1828 

91,914 

130,000 

7,815 

1829 

133,203 

142,000 

7,824 

1830 

209,634 

165,000 

7,163 

1831 

230,320 

191,000 

6,646 

1832 

448,171 

200,000 

8,888 

1833 

592,210 

218,000 

9,767 

1834 

456,859 

236,000 

10,552 

1835 

678,517 

254,000 

11,696 

1836 

825,729 

272,000 

14,216 

1837 

1,039.241 

290,000 

11,994 

1838 

873,013 

308,000 

13,512 

1839 

957,436 

326,000 

15,539 

1840 

1,008,220 

347,0(10 

15,000 

1841 

1,115,045 

290,000 

18,171 

1842 

1,286.618 

230,000 

21,586 

1843 

1,478,926 

312,000 

21,000 

1844 

1,899,805 

394,000 

22,000 

1845 

2,352,984 

486,000 

26,500 

1846 

2,707,321 

765,000 

25,000 

1847 

3,327,155 

800,000 

25,000 

1848 

3,572,695 

800,000 

22,500 

1S49 

3,724,806 

650,000 

21,000 

1850 

3,863,365 

563,755 

19,500 

1851 

5,190,690 

413,000 

16,500 

1852 

5,725,148 

540,755 

14,000 

1853 

5,940.905 

723,214 

15,000 

1854 

6,846,556 

662,216 

14,000 

1855 

7,684,542 

700.159 

14,000 

1856 

7,999,767 

788,515 

14,000 

1857 

7,694,842 

712,640 

14,000 

1858 

7,864,230 

629,552 

14,000 

1859 

9,010,726 

750,560 

14.000 

1860 

9,807,118 

821,223 

14,000 

1861 

9,147,461 

653,164 

14,000 

1862 

9,026,211 

702,912 

14,000 

1863 

10,953,077 

846,075 

14,000 

1864 

11,631,400 

1,013,837 

14,000 

1865 

10,783,032 

831,768 

13,165 

1866 

14,233,919 

1,200,199 

. 14,342 

1867 

14,345,644 

1,305,015 

13,662 

1868 

15,810,466 

1,431,250 

14,636 

1869 

16,375.678 

1,711,276 

15,653 

1870 

17,819,700 

1,696,429 

15,922 

1871 

17,370,463 

1,707,685 

17,854 

1872 

22,032,265 

2,539,783 

23,106 

1873 

22,828,178 

2,560,962 

46,661 

1874 

21,667,386 

2,401,261 

53,219 

1875 

20,643,509 

2,108,554 

53,000 

Total, 

341,521,423 

40,000,000 

855,000 


Copper, 
in tons of 
2240 tbs. 
avoir. 

Quicksil¬ 
ver, in 
flasks of 
76}/£lbs. 
avoir. 

Gold, 
in dollars, 
U. S. coin. 

Silver, 
in dollars, 
U. S. coin. 

Petrol’m 
in barrels, 
of 42 gal¬ 
lons. 
























.r. 

































































. 





































2,680* 

100 

150 

300 

500 

700 

600 

800 

1,000 

1,850 

2,250 

3,000 

4,000 

4,800 

5.500 
6,300 
7,200 

7.500 
9,000 
6,474 
6,518 
6,811 
6,978 
7,774 
9.467 

11,858 

12,650 

12,546 

11,948 

15.573 

17,548 

15,625 














20,000,000* 

10,000,000 

40,000,000 

50,000,000 

55,000,000 

60,000,000 

65,000,000 

60,000,000 

55,000,000 

55,000,000 

55,000,000 

50,000,000 

50,000,000 

46,000,000 

43,000,000 

39,200,000 

40,000.000 

46,100,000 

53,200,000 

53,500,000 

51,700,000 

48,000,000 

49,500,000 

50,000,000 

43,500,000 

36,000,000 

35,000,000 

39,(500,000 

33,400,000 









25,424* 

24,000 

20,000 

19,000 

27,000 

33,000 

30,000 

28,000 

31,000 

12,000 

10,000 

35.000 

42,000 

40,531 

47,489 

53,000 

46,550 

37,000 

37,000 

33,713 

29,546 

31,881 

30,306 

28,600 

34,254 

53,706 

















I, 000,000* 
100,000 

150,000 

2,000,000 

4,500,000 

8,500,000 

II, 000.000 
11,250,000 
10,000,000 
13,550 000 
12,000,000 
13,000,000 
16,000,000 
22,000,000 
25,750,000 
36,500,000 
32,800.000 
41,400,000 


3,200 

650,000 

2,113,600 

3,056,606 

2,611,359 

2,116,182 

3,497,712 

3,597.527 

3,347,306 

3,715,741 

4,215,000 

5,659,000 

5,795,000 

6,539,103 

9,879,455 

10,910,303 

8,787,506 

200,000 

840,000 

1,332,700,000 

261,450,000 

76,594,600 


* Including the whole previous period from 1776. 






















































































































































































































Production of Quicksilver at New Ahnaden for Twenty-three Years and Three Months. 




IN THE UNITED STATES. 


31 


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Of) 


A CENTURY OF MINING AND METALLURGY 


1860, 

1861, 

1862, 

1863, 

1864, 

1865, 

1866, 

1867, 

1868, 

1869, 

1870, 

1871, ' 

1872, 

1873, 

1874, 

1875, 


Production of Comstock Lode. 


$1,000,000 

2,275,256 

6,247,047 

12,486,238 

15,795,585 

15,184,877 

14,167,071 

13,738,618 

8,499,769 

7,528,607 

8,319,698 

11,053,828 

13,569,724 

21,534,727 


22,400,783 

26,023,036 


$199,824,364 

Or, in round numbers, $200,000,000; of which, about $80,000,000 
has been gold, and $120,000,000 silver, according to Mr. J. D. 
Hague. 


Production of Iron Ore and Pig-iron at Lake Superior. 


Dates. 

• 

Ore. 

Tons. 

Pig-iron. 

Tons. 

Total. 

Value. 

1856. 

7,000 


7,000 

$28,000 

1857. 

21,000 


21,000 

60,000 

1858. 

31,035 

1,629 

32,684 

249,202 

1859. 

65,679 

7,258 

72,937 

575,529 

I860. 

110,908 

5,660 

122,568 

736,496 

1861. 

45,430 

7,970 

53,400 

419,501 

1862. 

115,721 

8.590 

124,311 

984,977 

1863. 

185,257 

9,813 

195,070 

1,416,935 

1864. 

235,123 

13,832 

248,955 

1,867,215 

1865. 

196,256 

12,283 

208,539 

1,590.430 

1866. 

296,972 

18,437 

315,409 

2,405,960 

1867. 

466,076 

30,911 

496,987 

3,475,820 

1868. 

507,813 

38,246 

546,059 

3,992,413 

1869. 

633,238 

39,003 

672,241 

4,968,435 

1870. 

856,471 

49,298 

905,769 

6,300,170 

1871. 

813,379 

51,225 

864,604 

6,115,895 

1872. 

952,055 

63,195 

1,015,250 

9,188,055 

1873. 

1,066,875 

35,245 

1,102,120 

7,500,000 

1874. 

840,295 

72,740 

913,035 

6,800,000 

1875. 

829,115 

76,874 

905,989 

6,900,000 


8,281,698 

542,209 

8,823,907 

$65,575,033 












































